Raspberry Pi News - Page 2 of 203 - CNX Software

January 31, 2026January 31, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

M5Stack AI-8850 LLM Accelerator M.2 Kit offers an alternative to Raspberry Pi AI HAT+ 2

M5Stack has launched the “AI-88502 LLM Accelerator M.2 Kit 8GB Version” based on its LLM-8850 M.2 card with a 24 TOPS Axera AX8850 SoC, and offering an alternative to the Raspberry Pi AI HAT+ 2, supporting both LLM and AI vision workloads. The kit is comprised of the M.2 card and a Raspberry Pi-HAT 8850 board with USB PD power input for the card and Raspberry Pi 5, a 16-pin PCIe connector and 40-pin GPIO header for connection to the SBC, as well as accessories. M5Stack AI-8850 LLM accelerator M.2 kit specifications: M5Stack LLM‑8850 M.2 card SoC – Axera AX8850 CPU – Octa-core Cortex‑A55 processor at 1.7 GHz NPU – 24 TOPS @ INT8 VPU Video Encoder – 8K @ 30 fps H.264/H.265 encoding, supports scaling / cropping Video Decoder – 8K @ 60 fps H.264/H.265 decoding, supports 16 channels 1080p parallel decoding, supports scaling / cropping Memory (two options) 8GB 64‑bit LPDDR4x @ 4266 Mbps 4GB 64-bit LPDDR4x, 4266 Mbps (not […]

January 30, 2026January 30, 2026 by Debashis Das - No Comments

Forlinx OK153-S12 Mini – A low-cost Allwinner T153 SBC with Raspberry Pi GPIO header and long-term availability

Forlinx has introduced the OK153-S12 Mini, an Allwinner T153 SBC/development board, which looks to be a low-cost version of the OK153-S SBC that we previously covered. It keeps the same FET153-S SoM, but swaps the industrial terminal blocks, mini PCIe, and some other interfaces for a more compact footprint and a Raspberry Pi-compatible 40-pin header. The SBC supports up to 1 GB of DDR3 memory, up to 512 MB of NAND flash or 8 GB eMMC flash, and also features a microSD card slot for storage. Other interfaces include two Gigabit Ethernet ports, two USB Type-C ports for power, data, and debugging, and a USB 2.0 host port. Display is supported via an RGB LCD interface with backlight control via PWM. Other features include mono audio line-out via a 3.5mm headphone jack, multiple GPIOs, and buttons for reset, download, and user input, along with various status LEDs, and a 40-pin […]

January 28, 2026January 28, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Ariel OS – A Rust RTOS for IoT microcontrollers

Ariel OS is a new RTOS for microcontrollers written in Rust with support for popular hardware architectures (Arm Cortex-M, ESP32, RISC-V) and boards from Espressif, Nordic Semi, Raspberry Pi, and STMicroelectronics. Ariel OS is built on top of Embassy Rust framework and embedded-hal Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) for embedded systems, and adds several OS functionalities and a multi-core capable scheduler. It is mainly designed for secure, memory-safe, networked applications on microcontrollers. The developers further describe Ariel OS as follows on the project’s website: Ariel OS follows an approach whereby it simultaneously integrates a curated ecosystem of libraries (available via crates.io), and adds missing operating system functionalities as depicted below. Such functionalities include a preemptive multicore scheduler, portable peripheral APIs, additional network security facilities, as well as a meta-build system to bind it all together. As a result, a low-power IoT developer can focus on business logic sitting on top of […]

January 27, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 6 Comments

SONOFF Dongle Max (Dongle-M) Review – A Zigbee/Thread PoE, USB, and WiFi adapter tested with Home Assistant

SONOFF Dongle Max Dongle-M review with Home Assistant Zigbee2MQTT ZHA

SONOFF sent us a sample of the SONOFF Dongle Max (also known as Dongle-M) Zigbee/Thread adapter with PoE support for review. It is based on Espressif ESP32-D0WDR2-V3 and Silicon Labs EFR32MG24 SoCs, and can serve as both a Zigbee coordinator and Thread Border Router, with connectivity options including Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and USB. The dongle is specifically designed for popular smart home platforms like Home Assistant, Zigbee2MQTT, ioBroker, and OpenHAB. Key advantages of the Dongle Max over the recently reviewed Dongle Plus MG24 include built-in Wi-Fi and Ethernet support (in addition to USB), Power over Ethernet (PoE), and a convenient Web Console for easier device configuration. It basically provides more flexibility thanks to a wider range of connection options, and it’s easier to place it in strategic locations since it doesn’t need to be connected directly to your Home Assistant server. In this review, we’ll go through the unboxing, initial setup, […]

January 26, 2026January 26, 2026 by Debashis Das - No Comments

Raspberry Pi CM5-based outdoor PoE security camera features 12.3 MP IMX500 sensor, IP66 enclosure

All in One Raspberry Pi AI Camera Kit with CM5 inside

Arducam recently launched the All-in-One Raspberry Pi AI Camera Kit with CM5, a Raspberry Pi CM5-based PoE outdoor security camera featuring a 12.3MP Sony IMX500 AI vision sensor housed in an IP66-rated enclosure. The camera combines pixel-level sensing and AI inference on a single chip, reducing the need for cloud processing while improving efficiency and privacy. The security camera supports operation from -20°C to +75°C, although image stability is only guaranteed in the 0 to 50°C range, potentially making it unsuitable for locations where temperatures drop below freezing. It can be used for perimeter security, construction site safety monitoring, traffic and parking enforcement, and public-space crowd analytics. All-in-One Raspberry Pi AI Camera Kit specifications SoM – Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5 (CM5) by default CM5004016 with 4GB RAM, 16GB eMMC Flash, no Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Image Sensor 12.3MP Sony IMX500 Intelligent Vision Sensor (as found on the Raspberry Pi AI camera) […]

January 24, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments

FOSDEM 2026 schedule – Embedded, RISC-V, Robotics, Rust, Open Hardware, and more

FOSDEM 2026 will take place on January 31-February 1, with thousands of developers meeting in Brussels to discuss open-source software & hardware projects. The free-to-attend “Free and Open Source Software Developers’ European Meeting” gets more traction every year, and in 2026, there will be at least 1,113 speakers, 1,016 events, 70 tracks, and potentially close to 10,000 attendees. As usual, I’ll create a virtual schedule with sessions most relevant to the topics covered on CNX Software from the “Embedded, Mobile and Automotive” and “Open Hardware and CAD/CAM” devrooms, but also other devrooms, including “RISC-V”, “Robotics and simulation”, and “FOSS on Mobile”, among others. I’m aware some of the talks overlap by a couple of minutes or so… FOSDEM 2026 Day 1 – Saturday, January 31 10:40 – 11:15 – RISC-V Vector optimisations in FFmpeg by Rémi Denis-Courmont FFmpeg is the most versatile multimedia codec and format support library, and was […]

January 23, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 8 Comments

3D printed breadboards optimized for Raspberry Pi Pico and ESP32 boards

Raspberry Pi Pico ESP32 board 3d printed breadboards

We’ve seen people try to make MCU development boards as breadboard-friendly as possible by leaving plenty of space to connect wires and components. lhm0 tackled the issue from the opposite direction and designed 3D printed breadboards optimized for Raspberry Pi Pico and ESP32 development boards. The Pico typically only leaves two rows of each side of a typical breadboard, and some ESP32 boards are wide enough to take all rows and, as a result, are unusable. The trick here was to design the breadboard for each board with an opening in the middle, so that they only take two rows (one on each side) on the 3D printed breadboard, and the user still has four rows on each side to play with, plus the top and bottom rows. We only have photos for two variants of the breadboard (highlighted in bold below), but a total of five breadboard designs are […]

January 22, 2026 by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 1 Comment

Raspberry Pi OS adds easier USB gadget mode support

Raspberry Pi OS Trixie now supports USB gadget mode out of the box, allowing users to connect to their Raspberry Pi boards over IP through USB without the need for a router. My first experience with USB gadget functionality was when I reviewed the Beaglebone Green Wireless SBC in 2016, but for some reason, official support for the Raspberry Pi ecosystem took a lot longer, and it was only officially implemented in Raspberry Pi OS Trixie images dated 20.10.2025 and later through the rpi-usb-gadget package. It’s been possible to use the USB gadget mode on Raspberry Pi OS for a while, but it was rather convoluted with outdated scripts, manual configuration steps, and platform-specific instructions. The new rpi-usb-gadget package streamlines the process and makes things much easier: The Raspberry Pi SBC will present itself as a USB Ethernet device when connected to a PC Users can SSH directly using the […]